Before preparing my comments on ways to "teach tolerance," I put out a message on the National Institute for Literacy listserv, asking for other teachers' experiences concerning the best ways to teach the emotionally-charged subjects of racism, sexism, and homophobia, as well as other "isms" and phobias we and our students may encounter every day. Several of those who responded recommended Us and Them: A History of Intolerance in America and its companion video, The Shadow of Hate. I was not familiar with this material before the A.L.R.I. let our agency, the Asian American Civic Association, borrow the booklet and the video for a few months. Watching the video with some of my colleagues was a powerful, humbling experience. As the images of intolerance and inhumanity haunted me, I kept thinking about why I never learned about most of these events in depth (and some not at all), and more important, why they are probably still not taught in any standard curriculum.
In my own classroom, the issues of racial and ethnic prejudice begin with a discussion of stereotypes. What usually develops is a list of both positive and negative characteristics of various groups: Chinese are hard-working and good at math, welfare recipients are lazy, Jews are wealthy and powerful. I wanted to explore the subjects of tolerance and differences in more depth, but I wasn't sure of the best way to do it with the Us and Them materials. On July 3, as part of a discussion on the meaning of freedom and America's independence, I chose to use an excerpt from the Shadow of Hate video. Before watching the tape, I tried to elicit some of the students' background knowledge. Many of them knew a little about the first Chinese immigrants who built the railroads and why the first whites came to the new land. We also went over some of the basic vocabulary of intolerance-slums, ghettos, lynching, mob, massacre-as well as some of the more subtle terms of the dominant culture: "influx of immigrants" and "American way of life."
I let the video run for about fifteen minutes, choosing only the first few segments of the tape. Our VCR had been pre-set to run closed captions of the narration, which is delivered at a slow pace, comfortable for many ESOL learners. The students, whose time in the U.S. ranged from thirteen years to less than one year, were clearly moved. One of them said, "This is what we have to teach each other so we can understand one another better." Another student wanted to know if she could borrow the video so she could watch it together with her family. Other students said they could only understand between twenty and fifty percent (this was a class of low intermediate-level Asian immigrant adults), but they wanted to know if they could watch more and how much of it dealt with present day issues. We watched only the segments of the first white settlers, early Protestant-Catholic differences, the massacre at Wounded Knee, and what happened to the Chinese after they built the railroads.
I plan to do more with these materials, both print and video. In the booklet, I found the shorter, sidebar articles most useful. For example, the brief pieces on religious intolerance in "No Place to Pray," on our response to human differences in "This Land Is My Land," on the disturbing reactions to "foreign" traits in "Nativism and the Know-Nothings," on the American democratic system in "Majority Rule," and on how tough economic times exploit differences in "The Bottom Line?." "Scapegoats" and "Anti-Semitism in History" were also worthwhile. I could also see myself using sections of the article, "A Rose For Charlie" to examine the issue of homophobia.
What makes this material so rich is that these complicated issues can be seen from so many different angles, not just either/or and black/white, but so many shades of gray. Using these materials will force us as teachers and counselors to examine our own long-held viewpoints about "the other." I hope to show my students that tolerance is a two-way street. One of the more memorable quotes from the Us and Them booklet came from John F. Kennedy during his 1960 presidential campaign, when he explained how dividing the country into "us" and "them" endangers everyone: "For a while this year it may be a Catholic against whom the finger of suspicion is pointed. In other years it has been and may some day be again a Jew or a Quaker or a Unitarian or a Baptist...Today I may be the victim, but tomorrow it may be you."
-Richard Goldberg
The video, Shadow of Hate, and the booklet, Us and Them, are written as teaching tools for those struggling to teach tolerance. They are the usual excellent quality productions of the Southern Poverty Law Center: well-written, soundly-organized, emotionally-powerful and eye-opening. However, using this curriculum with adult students who speak English as a second language would require major adaptations. The language is too sophisticated to use (in the order and density presented) for people who have limited English vocabularies and limited historical information. Extreme intolerance, for example, has a private lexicon: massacre, lynch, hang, expulsion, evacuation, reservation, internment camp, intimidate, slavery, race riot, vandalized, etc. The vocabulary for the historical and political information is also complex: campaign, poll tax, contract, public housing, organized labor, territory, Confederate, dissident, Republican and Democrat, civil rights, Old South, etc. Also, the visuals in the video would require much explanation: KKK uniforms, different flags, angry signs in windows, unfamiliar scenery, etc. Since the video and booklet are filled with these specialized vocabularies and scenes, the ESOL teacher would have to make major adaptations of the material. A good teacher could cut, edit and select small segments of the curriculum and use these as springboards for discussion. Also, with some effort, a teacher could put the vignettes into historical perspective so students could understand the setting and atmosphere.
The question is: Is the adaptation worth the effort? Apparently, teachers now create their own lessons or scour texts and libraries for some useful "tolerance" materials written at their students' language level. Given this apparent dearth of information for immigrants, Us and Them is a valuable base for beginning explorations of bias. The visuals in the video are powerful images of prejudice and hate and can evoke personal memories if the audience understands the context and vocabulary. And, because the material covers a wide variety of "minority" intolerance stories, from early Native American struggles to the Crown Heights incident, a teacher could prepare and select the stories with which his or her class could best identify.
Any competent teacher working with adult immigrants is faced daily with trying to explain the race paradox: How can the United States be both a welcoming country that folds itself into people of all nations and a rejecting country that really only assimilates select groups? The Shadow of Hate and Us and Them are good places to start the explanation.
-Lois Lord Waller
This is very good teaching material for high school students or students in a pre-college English as a Second Language reading class, but I think the wording is too difficult for our immigrant adult students whose average English ability is at or below the fifth grade level. Many of our students are also very new immigrants, so the concepts and the stories may be too intense for them. They may not be ready to be told of the horrible history of discrimination in this country before they have adjusted to their new lives here.
Nevertheless, an exposure to this history of discrimination may be good for them as they also start to think about and confront their own tendencies toward discrimination. Since most students in our vocational training programs are very job-oriented, they will be more receptive to the material if it is presented in such a way that it is workplace-oriented. Therefore, when I present this material, I will emphasize the importance of understanding another's cultural background and getting along with everybody in the same company as well as those whom the company serves. Getting along with one another is the foundation for the spirit of teamwork.
Since I will be meeting with students about once a week for an hour in the upcoming cycle, I plan to present bits of this material in the following ways: 1) Get a feel from them about what they think of prejudice and discrimination in this country as well as in their native countries, or what they have experienced. Then I will let them know that I plan to show a video on the history of discrimination in the next week or two. 2) Show them "A Rumbling in the Mines" from the video, which talks about the intolerance that Chinese laborers experienced as immigrants in 19th century America, and fill in parts of the historical background. Then we'll talk about this, using some of the suggested discussion questions in the teacher's guide. As an exercise, I will suggest they write down their feelings or whatever comes across their minds during this discussion. They will be encouraged to share these writings during our next informal meeting. 3) About two weeks later, I may show them "Street Justice," the story that depicts the strained relationships between two minority groups, Jews and African-Americans, that have both experienced oppression and discrimination. I will also have the students study the smaller article, "Heard It Through the Grapevine," with the hope that they will see the damage that can be caused by rumors and gossip.
-Connie Lam
In going through the materials and in discussing with colleagues how we could actually implement a Teaching Tolerance curriculum here, I began to verbalize my objectives. As the video says, trying to understand is the first step in breaking down barriers between "us" and "them." I would like my students to see, through the stories of people with whom they may or may not identify, the effects of hatred, intolerance, discrimination, stereotyping, scapegoating, and prejudice-in short, to understand the dangers of treating unfairly or just generalizing about people whom we do not know. I want learners to notice, perhaps best from the safety of distance, the different ways people divide "us" from "them" and then choose to feel that those with differences are threatening to us rather than interesting to us. Ideally I would follow with an exercise in brainstorming stereotypes and then in stereotyping ourselves. We would all try to re-examine how we see each other and discuss how prejudice could or already does affect our lives, either as a source or an object. I imagine that the ensuing discussion could be transformative, though I admit that I haven't tried it yet!
This short review is just the beginning in many ways. There should be a collection of related curriculum materials specifically for lower level ESOL. We need more and varied "ways in" (for example, not just the Martin Luther King holiday). We need to get our diverse students together in person or on-line. And we need to share lessons we have already developed so that others don't need to re-invent them. I hope there will be more to come.
-Rebecca Pomerantz
Two primary resources the curriculum provides for a basic ESOL curriculum are historical information and accompanying pictures and photographs. There are also creative activity ideas within the curriculum guide that can be adapted for the lower literacy levels. The major limitation for the literacy and basic level classes is the actual text of the video and the writings. While the content is highly relevant, the language level is quite high. There are a few concrete ways, however, in which we can use the resources directly, as well as indirectly.
As an educator, I appreciated reading critical stories I never knew before. I didn't know the particular story of Harriet Jacobs, was only vaguely familiar with Quaker origins, didn't know the history of Rosewood, Florida, nor of the gay man in Maine. For events with which I was familiar, I was happy to have summaries packed with information at my fingertips (i.e. Crown Heights, Japanese internment camps and Wounded Knee). Working with immigrants, I believe ESOL teachers do inherently play a role in facilitating information about this country and have a responsibility in presenting more accurate information about the United States than what the media portray or what the myths of our holidays portray. The Shadow of Hate is a particularly good historical resource for exploring issues of intolerance based on race and immigration in the United States, or for a staff development series on racism. As every educational institution is offered one free copy, it's a no-lose deal. There's no reason not to get it.
As a basic level ESOL teacher I can adapt the stories by using the historical information in the articles to create two-paragraph excerpts for my class. A.very clear example might be in an ESOL unit looking at some aspect of immigrant discrimination/oppression. Drawing from the varied stories of immigrants in this resource, I can give clear examples of other cases of immigrant discrimination throughout United States history. This historical inquiry provides us with tools to see and articulate current immigrants' experiences of hostility within a deep pattern of intolerance that needs to be dismantled.
In this particular lesson, I might ask students in groups to start by writing on newsprint a list of problems they face as immigrants. Groups come back to share their responses with the entire group. Then, using four re-written pieces based on the histories from this curriculum (maybe the ones on the Japanese, the Quakers, the Irish, and the Chinese), students could work in groups to discuss one of the histories. Each group could read a paragraph or two about the group's experience in the United States, jot down unknown vocabulary, and respond to questions about the reading. Questions could include, for example: "What problems did the Japanese face?" "How are their problems different from the problems you face?" "How are their problems similar?" They could then share their particular story and responses with the entire group at the end. In this sample class, images of the video that pertain to the readings could be shown as people are coming in. Students could brainstorm on what they see in the video images as a starter activity.
This is one example, yet other texts could be integrated into other relevant class themes. The story of Harriet Jacobs might tie in with the struggles people go through to become free from oppression and improve their lives and that of their families. The story of Crown Heights could be adapted to talk about conflicts in students' communities between racial/religious groups. The story of the Ghost Dances could be relevant in talking about indigenous peoples in students' countries, as well as this one.
Some of the activities suggested in the curriculum guide can also be adapted in unique ways for a literacy classroom. For example, the guide suggests breaking into small groups to do research on a different topic and then presenting the findings to the class, which is a possible activity for adult learners. Class time could be used for doing this research-in a trip to the library or by reviewing books or other resources during class. In addition to reflecting a more participatory method where the traditional teacher/student paradigm shifts to a co-educator environment, some studies also indicate that small group education in multi-racial settings can foster better tolerance within the classroom itself. (Robyn Holmes, How Children Perceive Race, Sage Series on Race Relations, vol. 12, 1995. Although this text addresses children's classrooms in particular, I believe it provides an additional strong argument for small cooperative group education in any educational setting.)
Finally, I think what can be particularly powerful are some of the pictures and photographs provided by the Us and Them text and the video. Using pictures allows students to respond to and interpret the images through their own experience. There are no "right" or "wrong" answers, and it is a multilevel exercise. (Students can write just words or sentences, or can practice a grammar point if needed-using prepositions, present progressive, etc.). I particularly noted the recurring photographs of signs of unwelcome: "Japs Keep Moving," "White Power," "No Chinese Employed," or "Colored Admission," etc. In this same sample class investigating immigrant discrimination, one could copy these pictures and give them to groups or individuals to describe. Many other pictures could similarly be used at any level of ESOL for a point of discussion or writing. This is a clear example of a direct use of the materials that requires little re-working.
I need to reiterate, however, that the curriculum was clearly not created for the adult literacy level ESOL learner, so as with much available curriculum containing useful resources, basic ESOL educators must do major adapting to make the material accessible to the students in terms of language level. Another JP staff member, Amy Brodigan, agrees and suggests that it would work best for 11th and 12th graders. Amy also pointed to the importance of using the articles as vehicles to discuss current issues students face in Boston. Indeed, this is an important aspect of our program's goals to incorporate participatory methods where students' own experiences are a vehicle for language learning.
After using this video among other videos and TV clips this summer, I realize there is a distinct advantage when videos have moving images rather than pictures. Videos such as the Eyes on the Prize series provide more live footage that clearly visualizes some of the conflict, marches, and boycotts of the African-American civil rights movement. These moving images make the content of the videos even more accessible to basic and literacy ESOL classes (as the text can already provide still pictures).
The Shadow of Hate curriculum seems to be an integral part of any educational program's collection addressing prejudice and intolerance. It provides a wide spectrum of historical pieces that touch upon religious, ethnic and racial strife throughout the past three centuries in this country. The articles reveal history that allows current students to see the oppression and discrimination that they might be currently facing within a long history of fear within this country. While not intentionally made for the adult ESOL classroom, there are effective ways to integrate its resources and content to foster discussions of tolerance.
-Charissa Ahlstrom
This curriculum clearly offers an excellent framework for classroom discussion of prejudice and intolerance. By presenting so wide a range of victims, the video problematizes the nature of prejudice and therefore widens the context for its discussion. Intolerance emerges as something more complicated than hatred of any one ethnic or racial group. There emerges a certain shared sense of vulnerability, which in turn encourages focus on the perpetrators of such violence and intolerance, rather than a singular focus on the victims. And by forcing us to see victims in the context of other victims, the video discourages the temptation to individualize-or fetishize-prejudice.
Several students made just this point. One woman, who offered that she is of both African and Native American descent, shared that the film showed her that prejudice is not something that is directed only at black Americans. Others in the class agreed with her point, and expressed similar surprise that so many different groups of people have suffered. The consensus seemed to be that what the video presented was largely news to them, and their feelings about hearing this news seemed a combination of exasperation, frustration and intense curiosity. The combustibility of this combination was just the sort we look for to generate good critical discussion.
One of the points voiced by a number of students was that if you are not white, you are bound to be a victim of hate. When they were reminded that the video showed how white Irish-Americans suffered intense prejudice, they were forced to look again at this conclusion, and this moved the discussion beyond color. It was at this point that the tremendous value of this program revealed itself, because we found ourselves focusing on the nature of intolerance and prejudice, and asking where they come from. In other words, rather than looking only at how people hate, we began to look at why people hate. And we began to generate ideas about where hate and intolerance come from.
The fact that the video so successfully leads viewers to look at the perpetrators of violence is one of the strengths of the program, but it also points to a possible weakness. The video, and its literature, say little if anything about who these perpetrators were and are. They say even less about possible sources of intolerance. Perhaps this is best left to the instructor, but if this is so, it seems imperative that lesson plans address this directly. The danger here is that students might be left with the impression that hatred is a white, Angle-Saxon phenomenon only, a phenomenon that arises from a particular ethnic, racial position, rather than a more complicated position and ideology that is always caught up in issues of power, class and the like.
In this same vein, and perhaps most troubling, the producers of the video chose not to include either the case of gay-bashing in Maine or the Quaker piece, which has as its victim a woman. I think this points to a larger flaw in the program generally. Even in the literature, the Quaker episode is presented as more of a case of religious intolerance than a case of violence against women. And it seems to me remarkable that nowhere in this program is there mention of violence against women and the long struggle for women's rights, considering this is one of the defining struggles in American history, and that the problem of violence against women remains so intense. Likewise, it also seems a problem that the gay-bashing segment did not make the video, given that research has established so many connections between homophobia and sexism.
These specific omissions reinforce the larger problem mentioned earlier that the program offers little in the way of complicating the agents of intolerance. It is ironic that in its publication False Patriots, the Southern Poverty Law Centers writers remark-albeit in passing-that the vast majority of militia members are male, yet nowhere does the program present a gendered view of the hatred it calls attention to. It seems that, if most perpetrators of this sort of intolerance are male, then the video and literature should not only include, but foreground, homophobia and sexism as key examples, if not sources, of intolerance through American history. Is there something about patriarchy, about the way men are socialized, about masculinity, and about how all of these are caught up in power, that can help us understand intolerance?
All of that said, the fact that the video opens up these sorts of questions makes it valuable. It may be that what the video and literature do not say provide a unique opportunity for students to say more, on their own, in class discussions and in their writing. Its greatest value, then, may lie in its ability to open-rather than to close-a discussion that is probably best left open.
-Jeremy Earp